Brown offers recruiting pitch for ‘great’ free agent
CAMDEN, N.J. » The Sixers won 52 regular-season games this season. They’ll need more to win 53.
They had a 16-game winning streak to end the season. They’ll need more to make it 17.
They played in the second round of the playoffs. They’ll need more to play in the third, or the fourth.
The Sixers had a good team. Their head coach Friday made it clear that they can’t try to win a championship with that team again.
“I think that another high-level free agent is required,” Brett Brown said at an end-of-the-season press conference. “And I feel like we have the ability to attract one.”
With that, and by avoiding any tampering charges by not naming names, Brown began recruiting the one free agent most likely to thrust his team closer to a championship. Who? “We don’t have to turn this into calculus,” he said. “It’s quite clear.”
So without saying it, he was likely referring to LeBron James, who will become a free agent at the stroke of midnight July 1. The Sixers have the cap space to pay James … and enough perks to make a significant push for the four-time MVP to bring his talents to Camden.
“If I were a free agent, and of course I am biased, I would look at how a team plays,” Brown said. “And it’s pretty clear our style of play is exciting. I think it’s a modern-day way to play. I would look at the cultural aspects. I think we treat people well here. I think it’s a great place to come in and be a part of a culture and a family. When you look at the city of Philadelphia, and the sports-mad fans we have, it’s a great place to play. And when you can walk into our facility here and say, ‘I can come to work here every day,’ that’s a pretty good package.”
Among the recruiting lures the Sixers would present is that their young nucleus of Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid and Dario Saric is a foundation sturdy enough for James to continue to grow his collection of championships. James, though, is a player who will have the ball in his hands until he decides otherwise. That situation could clash with the necessity for Simmons to be an onthe-ball player, too.
“But if the player you are describing is ‘great’,” Brown said, with a sly smile, careful not to tamper, “we’d figure that stuff out.”
Such figuring will be the responsibility of general manager Bryan Colangelo, who recognizes the need to improve but was reluctant Friday to commit to buying a max-price free agent this offseason.
“We’ve got flexibility built into our plan, both in ‘18 and ‘19 potentially,” Colangelo said. “We’ve got the ability to improve this team this year. And if we decide to defer and have another stem year, if you will, it’s a situation where you may see us waiting to make a splash in free agency in 2019. But the flexibility and optionality of both is what we have been so diligent in protecting.”
In order to finance James, the Sixers would almost certainly not re-sign J.J. Redick, Ersan Ilyasova, Marco Belinelli and Amir Johnson, and would likely buy out the contract of Jerryd Bayless.
With James typically insisting on no more than a one-year contract, it has become customary for him to be a free agent every summer. For that, the Sixers could wait a year to make such a move.
“Bryan will figure out the design of the team in relation to what we’ve all learned,” Brown said. “J.J, Marco, Ersan, Amir and Jerryd Bayless are solid human beings and excellent players. So how you juggle that to get where we want to go, which is winning a championship, is a challenge.”
Either way, he believes it challenge that must be met.
“At some point when the time is right, I think we need help to win a championship, if that is the goal,” Brown said. “And for me, and for us, it is.” is a